Author: Bitpush Editorial Team
In the past month, Bitcoin has fluctuated violently around $80,000 to $90,000 for most of the time, while altcoins have generally retraced by 15%-40%. This has actually provided the most comfortable 'private accumulation' window for whales. According to real-time monitoring data of large holders tracked by Santiment and others, whales are quietly building positions in the following tracks, with some cryptocurrencies even reaching new highs in accumulation intensity for 2025.
1. Payment/Cross-border Settlement Track: XRP has become the favorite of whales
With the SEC and Ripple's settlement coming to fruition, the XRP ETF has also shifted from expectation to reality, further stimulating the accumulation behavior of whales. In the past 30 days, XRP has seen the most exaggerated net inflow of whales among all altcoins:
Addresses holding 100 million to 1 billion XRP have net increased by 970 million coins.
Addresses holding over 1 billion coins have net increased by 150 million coins.
The total inflow from the two types of addresses exceeded $2.4 billion;
The XRP balance on exchanges continues to decline, reaching a new low since 2023.
2. Established Layer 1: Accumulating ADA against the trend.
Cardano (ADA) experienced a very rare 'whale rotation buying' from November 24 to December 4 over 12 days:
The wallet with the largest holdings (holding over 1 billion coins) began to increase holdings on November 24, and has since accumulated an increase of 130 million ADA.
Wallets holding between 10 million and 100 million coins began to increase their holdings on November 26, with an increase of 150 million ADA;
Both groups achieved a net increase within a few days, indicating that even as ADA trading prices approached recent lows, the confidence of large holders remained strong;
Whales have a low cost basis; if the price can break through $0.43, it is expected to rise to $0.52. If it drops to $0.38, the bullish pattern will weaken, and reversal signals may fail.
3. DeFi blue chips: UNI and AAVE were both heavily purchased.
UNI: In the past week, whales added about 800,000 coins (worth nearly $5 million). After the fee switch vote passed, the top 100 addresses held a total of 8.98 million UNI, showing strong accumulation momentum, while the supply from exchanges has continued to decrease.
AAVE: In the past 30 days, whales added over 50,000 coins, bringing total holdings to an ATH of 3.98 million coins.
The common point of both: TVL continues to rebound + real income (fees) starts to rise, with whales laying out in advance.
4. Meme coins: Overall adjustment, with some being 'low-priced tickets' bought by whales.
Main battlefield:
FARTCOIN: A single address purchased 32.43 million coins (worth $10.7 million) within 24 hours.
PIPPIN: In the past 24 hours, 40.45 million coins (worth $7.28 million) were moved by whales.
PEPE: In the past 30 days, whale holdings have increased by 1.36%, totaling over 10 million coins. In summary, speculative funds and old money have entered together, and after liquidity is exhausted, a violent surge may occur at any time.
5. AI + data track: ENA and TIA are the most favored.
ENA (Ethena): In the past 7 days, whale holdings increased by 2.84%, and the top 100 addresses increased by over 50 million coins.
TIA (Celestia): Exchange supply decreased by 5%, Staking ratio and TVL both reached historic highs.
AI narrative + modular narrative overlay has become one of the long-term tracks with high certainty in this round.
6. Storage track: FIL and ICP.
Starting in late November, whale addresses for FIL and ICP simultaneously showed large transfers out of exchanges, the number of active addresses and TVL synchronized to rebound, and the demand for decentralized storage from AI large models is being realized.
FIL: In the past 30 days, whale holdings increased by over 100,000 coins, totaling approximately $50 million; exchange supply decreased by 15%.
ICP: The number of active on-chain addresses increased by 30%, and whales transferred out over 50,000 coins from exchanges; TVL rebounded to $120 million.
Summary
It can be seen that the current operational logic of whales is:
A pullback is a buying window; the more it falls, the more it is bought, almost ignoring short-term prices;
Prioritize tracks with 'real income' or 'policy dividend certainty';
Meme coins still represent a high-risk, high-return 'lottery zone';
The long-termism track (AI, modularization, storage, privacy) has been preemptively laid out by whales 2-3 quarters in advance.
Risk warning: Whale accumulation does not guarantee an increase, and it may also become subsequent selling pressure. Please make sure to DYOR, trade cautiously, and strictly control positions.
